Field
The present disclosure relates to optical communication equipment and, more specifically but not exclusively, to a network employing multi-endpoint (MEP) optical transceivers and to methods for configuring and operating the same.
Description of the Related Art
This section introduces aspects that may help facilitate a better understanding of the disclosure. Accordingly, the statements of this section are to be read in this light and are not to be understood as admissions about what is in the prior art or what is not in the prior art.
In a hybrid packet/circuit-switched network, optical circuit switches may be installed to augment electrical packet-based switching. Network management scripts or software-defined networking (SDN) may then be used to dynamically (re)direct data flows either through the packet-switched portion or through the circuit-switched portion of the network. One possible use of hybrid packet/circuit-switched networks is in the field of data centers, which is growing in importance, for example, due to the crucial role of data centers in supporting various Internet-based applications, such as cloud computing and storage, search, video content hosting and distribution, social networking, etc. Since the underlying network has a significant impact on the agility and re-configurability of the data center infrastructure, design of suitable network architectures for data centers is currently an active area of research and development.